Losing a Loved One

Tom, with your recent experience, I have to agree with you.

For the longest time I sat and second guessed myself even when I knew I did the right thing. Holding the hand of your loved one - you're most cherised one - as she takes her last breath and you listen to her heart stop beating as I did... A person can't help but be changed by that.

Loving those clear, sunny, and chilled fall days and then spending those days alone, just on the heels of saying good bye and dreading those days now because they'll bring those memories back and the desperate feeling of such loneliness.

Driving down the road and seeing something and thinking how much you think, "I've got to tell, Sarah about that!" and having the sinking feeling of realization come back that she's not waiting at home for you to tell her.

The dreams that haunt you. "She's alive!" Only to wake up and know she's not laying beside you. And the anger and overwhelming sadness that hits you in the chest like a freight train.

Thinking of her and literally feeling a pain in your chest.

It does change you.

It's on us, though, to control that change.

I sit now and share those memories of the best of times and hold her to me once again. With a glad heart and love, having known her and now being able to share those memories with people who didn't.

We know I've since remarried (and been judged for it, but that's a story for a different day) and have a handsome, smart little boy born on the anniversary of Sarah's death, in one of God's twists.

He's taken the memories of those lonely fall days and filled them with joy again.

So, yes, you're right. We do change. But a lot of times in ways we can never imagine.